Pretty in Pieces

Anyone that knows me knows that I am not a fan of heights. I’m terrified of them actually. So when I decided to go skydiving it came as a shock to everyone, including myself.

Skydiving had never been on my bucket list, was never something I envisioned myself doing, never something that I wanted to do. And yet, I did it. And I am so incredibly glad that I did. Skydiving is unlike any other experience you can have. In fact, it’s so unlike anything else that it’s hard for me to come up with the words to describe it.

 

Prior to getting on the tiny plane I would soon be jumping out of, I was beyond nervous. At the time, I had only been on a plane one other time in my life. And that was when I was 8 years old. And I stayed on board the plane for the duration of that flight. Once I was up in the sky, I was relatively calm given what I was about to do. It wasn’t until they opened up the plane door thousands of feet up in the air that I started panicking again. Because why in the world would a person willingly jump out of a plane? The answer to that became clear to me soon enough: because it was unbelievably fun.

 

During freefall, the period of time before you reach the ‘pull zone’ and your chute opens, it was cold. And hard to breathe. It was also a bit disorienting tumbling through the sky at such a high speed. Freefall only lasted for about a minute and a half.

 

 

 

 

Once the chute opened up, it was surprisingly peaceful floating gently to the ground. The instructor and I chatted amicably the rest of the way to the ground.

 

 

 

 

 

Skydiving may not have originally been on my bucket list, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t add it on after the fact. I may still be afraid of heights but I didn’t let that fear prevent me from experiencing something that was truly amazing.

 

What about you? What’s something you’ve done that was out of your comfort zone?

~xo~

Rachel